A good number of people, including This Week in Tech host Leo Laporte, swear by the posture-fixing, back-pain-reducing powers of using an exercise ball as your office chair. But a few different studies suggest otherwise.

Despite burning a few more calories per hour than a desk chair, exercise balls aren't as corrective of poor posture as once thought. And one study suggests there are notable disadvantages to ball-sitting:

Advertisement

Another study last year, by Dutch researchers, compared workers who did hourlong typing tasks on exercise balls and while seated in office chairs with armrests. The balls produced more muscle activity and 33 percent more "trunk motion." But they also produced more spinal shrinkage.

"It is concluded that the advantages with respect to physical loading of sitting on an exercise ball may not outweigh the disadvantages," the researchers wrote.

On the plus side, they might inspire their users to move around a bit more, and maybe correct their posture manually more often. If you're an exercise ball fan, or experienced nay-sayer, tell us your take in the comments.